


this queen you think you own

by livbartlet



Category: Prime Suspect (US)
Genre: Crime, Detectives Detecting, F/M, Gen, Murder Mystery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-24 11:33:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12011856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livbartlet/pseuds/livbartlet
Summary: Murder, detectives, pseudo-fairytale characters, a beginning.





	this queen you think you own

**Author's Note:**

  * For [erunamiryene](https://archiveofourown.org/users/erunamiryene/gifts).



> Because while we stared at Chris Hemsworth's rugged everything on a movie poster, erunamiryene said she wanted a story where The Hunter is a woman. So I decided to write Prime Suspect fic. And then I went even further off prompt. Or something. Do not even act surprised at my random brain. Fills _27\. The hunter_ from 100 Fairy Tale Prompts.

 

 

"Get your picture in the paper real good this one, won't you now," Reg observes with that dry inscrutability that could be meanness or sarcasm - another needle at the back of her neck - or nothing at all.   
  
"Only if I solve it." She sips her coffee, betting on the nothing at all, and winks at him under her hat, blinks at the sunlight. Smiles at him, even, without malice or intent.   
  
  
  
  
  
(He was right, back then, wasn't he - he is her favorite, the honest one.)  
  
  
  
  
  
(You catch a case, all you hope for is to close it. Tie it up nice and neat, and that is your gift - to the victim(s), the D.A., to yourself - and maybe it's not the prettiest under the tree, but it does the job.  _You_  do your job, and that's all you really care about.)  
  
  
  
  
  
(Jane does not hope. She hunts. She works. And maybe she  _cares_ , but that's her business.)  
  
  
  
  
  
It's a lot of blood. Like overpriced art splashed across an extra large canvas. A canvas that happens to include some overpriced art of its own.  
  
And then there's the view. There is blood, here, at the top of the world. Who knew.  
  
"No one walks away from this without blood on 'em."  
  
"Right. Thank you, Reg, King of the Obvious. Our perp's got blood to get rid of."  
  
"On it," Lou rasps when she nods at him. The Maybe Game should yield some interesting scenarios.  
  
She studies the blood, decides she doesn't like it. "Tell me something, Reg."  
  
"Yeah, what's that."  
  
"Do fat cats bleed more, or is it just my imagination."  
  
"Wounded perp, maybe. Have the uniforms check the hospitals and such."  
  
Jane taps a finger on her right knee, crouching to get a different angle. Blood spatter tends toward modern art meets fingerpainting anyway, but this is different somehow, something she can't put her finger on yet. "An extra vic, maybe."   
  
It's too much blood.  
  
  
  
  
  
(This is not the case that destroys Detective Jane Timoney. There is no such thing. Not when you are Jane, perfectly capable of destroying things all on your own, never mind what your job brings to the table.)  
  
  
  
  
  
Interviewing the victim's wife (trophy wife) goes much like you expect these things to go. Mrs. Fat Cat is shocky but composed, pale but put together - style as armor. Uselessly useful in terms of information - yes her husband had a lot of enemies, no she doesn't know when he got home she was at her regular Wednesday dinner date with her best friends, he was supposed to be working late on a big project...  
  
Shock does funny things to people, but the wife is neither as vacuous nor as vicious as Jane would expect from someone who came home to find all of  _that_  in her living room. Until:  
  
"I want her heart. I want it ripped out, I want it in a box."  
  
"Whose heart, ma'am?"  
  
"My stepdaughter."  
  
Jane leans forward - just a little - while Duffy leans back and they exchange a look.  _"Well, isn't this interesting."_  
  
  
  
  
  
(Duffy brings the coffee back to the car. When this became a regular thing - habitual, natural - Jane has no idea.)  
  
  
  
  
  
"Probably an inheritance at play. Big or small, money drives a lot of people to murdering."  
  
"Or she just hated her old man."  
  
"You and I both knows that list is long, Jane."  
  
"There is the evil stepmother angle - I kinda like that one."  
  
"Tread careful, is what Lieutenant's gonna say."  
  
"Aw, don't worry about me, Reg. You know I'm always careful."  
  
"Like fun I do."  
  
  
  
  
  
(It's easy to work late, stop by the bar and drink a little later than that, easy to meet the accusation of being the boy scout of ending relationships - always prepared to cut and run - easy because it's the truth, and isn't Matt so smart for figuring it out so quick.)  
  
  
  
  
  
Bianca Kendall, kindergarten teacher and heiress, is nowhere to be found. Apartment, job, cell phone, credit cards - all no joy.  
  
"Somebody make my day. Somebody tell me there's more than one person's blood at that scene."  
  
"Did you just say  _make my day_?"  
  
"Shut up, Augie."  
  
"Lab won't know 'til tomorrow. Can I make your day tomorrow?"  
  
Jane cheerfully flips him the bird, and the squad room laughs.  
  
  
  
  
  
(She wakes up shaking, blames it on blood spatters and coffee and the never-ending need for a cigarette, slaps on an emergency nicotine patch, never once thinks about how alone she is.)  
  
  
  
  
  
Answers from the lab only raise more questions. Blood from one person, only one. No sign of blood from any perps or other victims. Accounting for possible variations in how much blood the "average" body contains and the size of the victim, it's  _possible_  that six or so liters of blood got sprayed across the crime scene from just the vic. But not probable, really, since the guy hadn't exactly been sucked dry by a vampire or anything.  
  
"I knew I didn't like it." Jane surveys the scene again, squints at particularly high and wide arc of blood on the wall.  
  
"So, all this blood from one guy. But how?"  
  
"Wall Street bloodsucker...Did he ever donate blood...Somebody making a point." She steps back. "Look at this," another step back and it all lines up, "it's a work of art."  
  
"How so?"  
  
"Look at the painting, look at our scene."  
  
Reg stands next to her, considers for a moment. "Christ. I hate the sicko cases."  
  
  
  
  
  
(She ignores a text from Matt. Correction: she does not respond to a text from Matt. He misses her? What the hell does that mean. Like she doesn't miss him, too. Vaguely. Maybe. She's not sure. It's a good question, so she avoids it. Does she miss Matt?)  
  
  
  
  
  
"Can you protect me?"  
  
The stepdaughter walks into the precinct, pale and tired but straight-backed with something more than pride, asks for the detectives investigating the murder of Henry Kendall, and then looks Jane in the eye and asks: "Can you protect me?"  
  
"Protect you from what, Miss Kendall?"  
  
"From  _her_ , from my stepmother."  
  
"What do you think she's going to do to you?"  
  
"Kill me. Just like she killed my father."  
  
"That's interesting. She says you did it."  
  
"Of course that's what she says." Determination. That spine of hers is straight with steely determination, Jane decides. Which she admires. But that doesn't mean the girl is innocent.  
  
"Why the disappearing act?"  
  
"It was part of the plan." She falters, grows paler, swallows. "He wasn't supposed to die, he was just going to fake his death, with the blood, and after a while even without a body he'd be declared dead and he would be free somewhere..."  
  
"Free?"  
  
"From all of his mistakes, from her."  
  
"Or maybe just prosecution for all those  _mistakes_  like millions in fraud and whatever else the SEC and FBI were looking at. This little story is not helping you."  
  
"You don't have to believe me. I saw her do it."  
  
"Maybe I believe you, maybe I don't."  
  
  
  
  
  
(Crawling up inside him, getting under his skin, feeling him under hers...skin and sweat and sex...she would be lying if she said she doesn't...want.)  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"What's your feeling on this one, Janey?" Sweeney, forever asking her what her gut tells her just before he tells her to back it the fuck up with some evidence.  
  
"That I'm about to blow up the wife's alibi."  
  
  
  
  
  
(Duffy brings her scotch this time. "To getting your picture in the paper," and they drink. "To evil stepmothers," and they drink some more. And more.   
  
It's just another case, right. One that doesn't even send her upstate to be run ragged and shot at. So it shouldn't bother her this much. It's the blood. She sees it with her eyes closed.  
  
"Reg."  
  
"Jane."  
  
Only another hunter would know.)  



End file.
